Kefir

I started making Kefir last month and LOVE it! I bought my Kefir grains at Yemoos (not sure how you pronounce it) and Cultured Food Life. I bought at two places for two reasons, one, just in case one didn't survive traveling in the mail, I was sure the other would, and two, I wanted to multiply the Kefir grains, like pronto. I had a limited time to multiply them for my sis and family in California.

Both arrived safe and sound. Here is what I got from Yemoos.

I thought the Certificate of Adoption was a nice touch. I am not super creative with names and had already started calling them my babies so I named them Kefir Babies.

Cultured Foods came in a nice little glass container.

It didn't take long for me to start making yummies with Kefir. Below is my Raspberry Yum, I put 1/2 tsp vanilla, 1 Tablespoon Baobab powder, stevia to taste (I put a few doonks), 1 Tablespoon Collagen, and a handful (maybe a cup) of frozen raspberries. I used my hand blender to mix it up and poured it into the jar so it would look all swirly. This jar, the kneck was too thin so I had to transfer it to the blender container.

 It wasn't long before I had lots of yummy Kefir.

More Kefir, at the time of this writing I have 10 gallons in the fridge.

I will slow production down now that I multiplied my Kefir grains but I sure did love straining the Kefir. I looked forward to it every day. At first, I was straining twice a day because it was warm in my house. Then the weather cooled and it went to once a day.

My beautiful grains =)

Below is a little video of a batch that came out really nice.



Did you see Sadie, in the video? She is our new little dog, although she's growing like crazy.

Below is the day we brought here home. She was so big-little.

Back to Homeschool 2017/2018

Wow, another year has officially begun here at Homeschooling6! I have only six years left of homeschooling. Wow, can you believe that mamas?!?!

We started full sing Monday the 18th of Sept. but are actually on our 3rd week. Our school start-up is a bit weird. Sept. 18th is considered our first day but we are on week three.

We had visitors the previous two weeks. One being my Mother-in-law, so we did part time school those weeks.

We started a new schedule Monday too! And I LOVE it! Here is how our homeschool week looks for Caleb 11th, Brent 10th, Ethan 9th, and Lance 7th. Annette does her Heart of Dakota/Fun-Schooling using The Thinking Tree.

My Boys are using different curricula and Thinking Tree.

Monday, Thursday, & Friday Schedule:
6:30 A.M. Mom wakes up. I make my hubby a smoothie every work morning.
7:00 Wake the kids, shower, get my bulletproof coffee ready.
8:00 Bible Time with Caleb 11th, Brent 10th, Ethan 9th, and Lance 7th.
9:00 History/Science - we rotate. One day we do History the next day Science and so forth.
10:00 Everyone pulls out their math books.
11:00 Caleb & Brent do Latin, Ethan works with me. We do Language Arts together. Lance does JAM -Minecraft School.
12:00 Lunch Hour!
1:00 Caleb & Brent do Language Arts, Ethan Thinking Tree School, Lance works with me doing Language Arts.
2:00 Everyone completed two pages in their Thinking Tree Journals.
3:00 Hopefully everyone finished their assignments

Tuesday Schedule is a little different because I go Live on Facebook at FREE HOMESCHOOL 101. From 6:30-8:00 A.M. the schedule is the same.
8:00  I get ready for my Broadcast (I review and talk about Thinking Tree Journals) the kids do Math.
9:00 I am Broadcasting. Caleb & Brent are doing Latin, Ethan & Lance are doing Thinking Tree School.
10:00 I'm going over my Broadcasting comments & questions and the Kids are working on independent school for the rest of the day. We are still tweaking our Tuesdays.

Wednesday is Video School Day! Our day looks something like this:
Same morning routine but we cut the first to "classes" in half.
8:30 Bible
8:30 Science/History
9:00-12:00 we watch educational videos!
12:00 Lunch
1:00 audio book or more video school
2:00 work on Film Study page in our Teen Journals from The Thinking Tree.

I need to do a an updated review on Leslie Monroe's Homeschool Hours Log Book! I love it. You can take a peek inside HERE.

My Girl is Turning 18!!!

It seems like yesterday I was bringing home my second child. I was so excited to have my little girl. We named her Annette Rose, Annette after a dear friend and Rose after my Aunt Rose and cousin Rosie, both very dear to my heart.

Today Annette and I went to have a Boba Tea. We didn't actually have tea but juiced veggies. I had the Detox which included an apple, lemons, cucumber, & ginger. Annette had the Energizer. It had the same as mine but carrots were added.

Look at the cute cup 'lids'. I LOVE Snoopy. Mine is the one with Snoopy skiing.

We also went to Hobby Lobby one of our favorite places to visit. I bought lots of baskets and she bought material.

Tomorrow she will be 18. Happy Birthday Annette. I love you. You are so sweet and kind.

My girl loves to sew. She recently completed a Linus Quilt. This is a quilt that she made (material was provided by the Linus project). I thought I had a picture of it on my computer but I don't. I'll have to edit this post to show it. She is becoming quite the quilter.

Fun Schooling: Video School Wednesday

We started a new schedule here at Homeschooling6. In fact, we had our first day Monday the 19th, our first full day anyway. We have been schooling a little here-and-there throughout the summer.

Today, Wednesday, was Video Day, meaning we did Bible, History, and Math using our curricula and videos the rest of the day. On Video Day the kids fill in the Film Study page from their Thinking Tree Journal.

This is what our day looked like:

7:00 A.M. I woke all the kids up. I was up at 6:00 (I'm not liking it one bit 😜)
8:00 Bible Time, we are using A.C.E New Testament Survey. I read through the lesson. We are also learning God's Names. Normally Bible Time is an hour but on Video Wednesday we shorten our lessons so we can watch lots of videos.
8:30 History - The Good and the Beautiful Level 1. I rotate this, so one day we do history and the next science. Next Wed. maybe a science day.
9:00 Math Time - all the kids get out math books and did 30 minutes of math. Normal time is 40-50 minutes.
10:00 we started late. We were supposed to start at 9:30 but we got distracted.
From 10:00-11:45 we watched:

1.  A Noble Experiment -with this we are watching the video together and discussing the questions in the workbook. I actually use the Teacher Manual. Today we watched Lesson 2 Foundational Principles
2. The Presidents - Washington and Adams
3. Adventure Novel - Lesson  The Heroic Quest
4. Max McLean -Genesis

12:00 we had lunch!

1:00 the kids completed to pages from their Thinking Tree Journals.

2:00 the kiddos studied AWANA verses and that was it! Normally our "school" ends at 3:00 but on Video Day it's an early day!

Summer School 2017 (Lance) Good & the Beautiful Language Arts

Throughout the summer we have been doing a little school here and there. Two days ago the weather wasn't overwhelmingly hot so Lance and I went outside to do a little school. Here he is working in his multiplication journal by Leslie Monroe.

 He alsow worked in his Dyslexia Games book.

 I read my book (that I lost and haven't been able to finish.=),

 Lance is also working on some Language Arts by the Good and the Beautiful. We are using this three times a week for 30-40 minutes a day. Once school starts back up we will use it four times a week. I had him start at a lower level and we are going to go through them a bit faster.

Below he's brushing up on his cursive practice using The Good & the Beautiful Handwriting program.

Once he completes the course I'm going to have him continue practicing with Trace-a-Story: Bible.

You can take a peek inside the multiplication book by Leslie in this video below.


See the inside of the Handwriting book by The Good & the Beautiful.

A peek inside Trace a Story.

Dyslexia Games

I absolutely LOVE, LOVE, Dyslexia Games. This therapy program is so unique that it's not only for Dyslexic children. Any child (or adult) can benefit with using Dyslexia Games.

Sarah Janisse Brown, the creator of this one of a kind therapy program, encourages to stop all other forms of Language Arts and use Dyslexia Games only. Dyslexia Games will become your child's temporary Language Arts program.

How can it become a temporary Language Arts program?  Dyslexia Games helps your child with concentration, fine motor skills, reading, writing, spelling. The program starts with your child doing logic puzzles. As the child moves through the program the activity pages 'transform' to reading and writing.

The reason Sarah encourages that we have our child stop their formal Language Arts or Phonics/Reading program when using this to help Dyslexic children is so their brains can be in a more "relaxed" mode. The child is not stressed and thus can concentrate and "work" at the logic puzzles to get the left and right sides of the brain working together.

Because this giveaway is for a set of physical books it's opened to U.S. Residents only.

When using Dyslexia Games it is instructed for some of the logic puzzles that your child use a smooth black pen. This is so your child will see a "continuous" line from the art in the book to your child's. Many times (especially the younger ones) your child will get really excited that you (mom/parent) won't be able to notice where their drawing begins from the one in the book.

If your child would like to use another color that is fine too.

To see some peek inside videos you can visit my YouTube Channel.

Please visit my Thinking Tree Page to see many of the beautiful journals Sarah Janisse Brown has created for children with Dyslexia, Asperger's Syndrome, ADHD, struggling readers, brilliant thinkers, and/or creative learners!

If you'd like to build your homeschooling around Dyslexia Games add a Core Journal (those are the journals that have over 300 pages). That is all! Have your child complete a few pages a day in the Core/Main Journal and do Dyslexia Games.

You can slowly add other subjects in like Spelling, Math, Writing, Geography, and History. Sarah created all her journals to be 'low' stress, so even if a child is using Dyslexia Games, he can use a few of the other journals as well.

See my Thinking Tree page for links to video and written reviews.

Galaxy Grammar

I have an exciting review coming up for you all, Grammar Galaxy!!! I'm so thrilled to introduce this awesome grammar program.

Basically, it teaching grammar through story and with short lessons. The stories and concepts are great for children in 1st-6th grade. You can start your child using the first level Nebula even if he is a beginning reader and writer because the parent will do the reading.

With older children, you can have the child read it to you or use it as a family read aloud.

I think this would pair great with the Thinking Tree Journals. You can use the story and have your child complete the Thinking Tree activity pages like Reading Time, Spelling Time, and Copywork!

If you would like to try a lesson, head on over to Grammar Galaxy and download yours!

I plan to have Lance read the story out loud to me. I'll write more about how we will use Grammar Galaxy along with The Good & the Beautiful Language Arts program.  I hadn't planned on using both programs but again, more about that later.

The Good & the Beautiful History Year 1

I've been silent lately. Lots happening. We had my sis-in-law and her family visit. They left last week. My boys, Brent and Caleb will be home August 9th. I'm super excited. Annette is home too!!!

I haven't got pics of everything we will use this year. In fact, I've been so scatter brained that I haven't got all my ducks in a row. Hopefully, by Sept. I'll have it all together.

I also got a new desktop and haven't switched all my photos which makes it hard to blog with no pics.

For history, I'm excited and I haven't been excited about history for a few years now. We will use The Good and the Beautiful (G&B). 

The reason I'm excited is because I'm going to use this with four of my kiddos: Caleb 11th, Brent 10th, Ethan 9th, and Lance 7th. We haven't done history together in years.

At first, I was going to have everyone use their own history and I'm kinda sad that Lance won't be studying the 50 States. BUT I think this will work for us.

Here is a video of what I got.

The kids and I have already started playing the game. I'm pleased to say all those years of Heart of Dakota paid off for Annette. She knows many of the answers.

With Caleb I will add a Government course.

Coffee, Coffee, Coffee

My mug for the day ☕ Love Chick-fil-A! Just coffee with cream. Keeping it simple on a Friday.

Saturday's coffee.
Just cream today 🐄 Enjoying coffee from a Darth Vader ☕ mug. This one belongs to Brent. He received the mug as a CHRISTmas gift from his sister.

Monday's coffee: drip coffee with a tablespoon of butter, MCT oil, and a scoop of vanilla bean protein powder.☕

Tuesday's cup of java: drip coffee with a tablespoon of Kerrygold butter, MCT Oil, and a scoop of Vanilla Bean Protein Powder. Yum! Yup, that's why I'm drinking this yummy coffee in my YUM mug =)

Rainy, thunderyWednesday morning but it cleared up enough for me to take the kids swimming. I had an antioxidant and gelatin-rich coffee, with some healthy fats: butter & MCT Oil in a Snoopy mug.

This coffee and mug arrived in the mail for Josh. He let me be the first to drink out of it. I love the shape, size, and thickness.
Today I used my Aeropress. Made a gelatin rich antioxidant coffee with butter and MCT Oil. I was going to add a scoop of protein powder but wanted to taste the coffee since it was a new brand.

What's in your coffee this morning ☕☕☕

Friday's mug (to be determined, haha)

Costco "Window" Shopping

My hubby dropped me off at Costco (this was a few weeks ago) while he took Annette to get her permit (what!?!). I was done shopping and waiting for hubby and the kids to come join me, so I went "window" shopping.

 I thought these would look nice in the backyard.

 Would love this nice set of Mikasa mugs. They are so pretty.

 I thought Josh and Caleb would appreciate these ThermoFlask drink bottles.

 I have been wanting a toaster oven for a loooong time, 15 years to be exact =)

 A great price for this Hamilton Beach hot water heater upper, funny!

 Thes G2 pens are my favorite. Especially the last six colors on the right.

 I would love a new dry erase board.

 Needed to see the price so I could show my hubby later, haha.

 Oooh, love this stove.

And this is what I actually walked out of Costco with, hehe.

😮And Annette got her permit 😮